The Fall of the Roman Empire
Since the fifth century, historians and others have argued over the empire’s fall. They
have attributed it to a variety of causes, coming both from within and outside the
empire. The following excerpts are examples of the differing opinions.
Using Primary and Secondary Sources
Edward Gibbon
In the 1780s Gibbon published The
4 The Fall of the Roman Empire
Roman Empire. In this passage,
Gibbon explains that a major cause of
the collapse was that the empire was
simply just too large.
The decline of Rome was the natural
and inevitable effect of immoderate
greatness. Prosperity ripened the
principle of decay; the causes of
destruction multiplied with the extent
of conquest; and, as soon as time or
accident had removed the artificial
supports, the stupendous fabric
yielded to the pressure of its own
weight. The story of its ruin is simple
and obvious; and instead of inquiring
why the Roman Empire was
destroyed, we should rather be
surprised that it had subsisted so long.
Arther Ferrill
In his book The Fall of the Roman
Empire (1986), Arther Ferrill argues
that the fall of Rome was a military
collapse.
In fact the Roman Empire of the West
did fall. Not every aspect of the life of
Roman subjects was changed by that,
but the fall of Rome as a political entity
was one of the major events of the
history of Western man. It will simply
not do to call that fall a myth or to
ignore its historical significance merely
by focusing on those aspects of Roman
life that survived the fall in one form or
another. At the opening of the fifth
century a massive army, perhaps more
than 200,000 strong, stood at the
service of the Western emperor and his
generals. The destruction of Roman
military power in the fifth century was
the obvious cause of the collapse of
Roman government in the West.Finley Hooper
In this passage from his Roman
Realities (1967), Hooper argues
against the idea of a “fall.”
The year was 476. For those who
demand to know the date Rome fell,
that is it. Others will realize that the
fall of Rome was not an event but a
process. Or, to put it another way,
there was no fall at all—ancient Roman
civilization simply became something
else, which is called medieval. [It
evolved into another civilization, the
civilization of the Middle Ages.]A SECONDARY SOURCE B SECONDARY SOURCE C SECONDARY SOURCE
D PRIMARY SOURCE
St. Jerome
This early Church leader did not
live to see the empire’s end, but he
vividly describes his feelings after a
major event in Rome’s decline—the
attack and plunder of the city by
Visigoths in 410.
It is the end of the world... Words
fail me. My sobs break in... The
city which took captive the whole
world has itself been captured.1.Compare the reasons for the fall
of Rome given in Sources A and
B. How might they be considered
similar?
2.What became of Rome according
to Source C? Do you agree or
disagree with that conclusion?
3.Source D is different from the
other sources. How?177